grotsnik
Yeah, but then the project lead gets fired and the game is rewritten into... that.
Despite there being PST to directly learn from what to do and when, with what specific rhythm and so on.
Politician Lurker King
Im fairly tired trying to talk to people who think in binary extremes. Not to worry though, youll have plenty of cRPGs with a lot of combat to play. Including endless random encounters and trash mobs.
Its not like the whole industry is going to change because of what i say - and i only meant this different style would fit some of the CRPGs, not all. Use more neurons then two, pls.
The race is on!
Also: you’re preaching to the choir. Your points are good and I agree with the gist of it: less encounters, better design, more (story) impact.
Basically turn the currently solely quantity focused combat systems toward combat systems that focus on quality (in a smaller quantity).
The first time I played PS:T I remember being pleasantly surprised when I could end the game by dying outside of combat. That’s one example of what I consider an alternative conflict resolution. You die - game ends. But you could have more options to end the game. Options that do not necessarily involve someone dying. People make choices. Imagine a Tyranny where you could walk into the wastes after the first in-game battle and leave that super-magic-overlord nonsense behind.
Anyway. Let’s take your non lethal combat example and try and steer this conversation back toward writing: If it’s just a mechanic that makes deadly encounters more impactful, then eventually that becomes rote as well and loses its emotional impact. This is where that “less (encounters) is more” comes in. Branching solutions and outcomes would be akin to branching choices and outcomes in a dialogue. A bitch to design and code, I’m sure.
EDIT:
And “less is more” works on many levels (it should include the lenght of my comments in this thread as well...). Open world games could try to gain scope by going into depth rather than width. Not every game has to be about a literal farmboy with a background tag “Ran away with the circus” fighting literal dragons in the third kingdom over (counting from the starting tutorial location).
Youll win that race.
I still have plan A to finish, which will allow me to do plan B and then maybe C or D would be the game.
Its not that i suggested non lethal combat as just another simple outcome of combat alone. Or to make deaths in the game - feel heavier.
I see it as a starting point that would enable much more options to become possible in a naturally logical and understandable manner. Options in the narrative, quest solutions and consequences and the whole story and the setting.
Its not just about combat - but how that extends into other parts of the game.
For one thing, if you dont kill an NPC and so remove him from the game - that means he can continue to serve as a character later on. With reactions on what you did and how. That transforms just another grunt the like you usually eradicate by thousands into a more or less full fledged NPC character. And then there are many variations possible on what you do and how any specific character will react to it.
You can beat someone and just leave it at that. You can beat someone and humiliate them after, or beat someone and terrorize them after, or offer a less aggressive or amicable reaction and so on and each different character personality will react differently to each of those variations - which also should have consequences for your reputation in any specific settlement, place or faction if there are any. And nobody needs to be telepathic because those people would be alive and able to tell others about it.
Alternatively some of them can beat you - and that is not the end of the game and instant reload. Then you get to choose how to react to that and cause further C&C.
Depending on how much resources, money and time you have to develop the game you can develop a whole spectrum of characters and reactions leading into further C&C and story/main plot consequences and options.
It also makes any murder a much more serious issue, which can be dealt with in various ways with heavier importance and deeper impact on the character and the player in terms of the quest/story and C&C and players own personal reactions.
As i said, this would be very fitting for the RPG game i have in mind because the usual bloodbath wouldnt make any sense. The setting, the story and main themes i would explore dont allow such an approach at all.
It cannot be a combat focused game at all, really. Although it could and should have some.
The whole combat system would be adapted to such options, naturally. TB but with a dash of spice... of interesting and cool stuff.
And that kind of TB could very nicely lend itself even to a more combat focused cRPG (but with non lethal options and combat resolutions) and enable decisions inside the combat to have deeper impact on the flow of the narrative.
For example i would love to see a fantasy based cRPG where wizards actually do magic instead of act as just another ranged fighter and kill stuff, and so enable different solutions to quests by affecting the environment and physical conditions.
That kind of magic would be fully integrated into the setting and less fantastic and "epic" then usual but more important and effective then any overblown meteor swarm could ever be.
While Bards serve to handle the diplomatic side of things inside of cities and towns, handle the lore, keep the journal and so on.
You lose all of that if you force the game to be combat focused because that forces all different character types to be focused on combat most of all.
And if you dont have to spend all the resources and time on so much combat... maybe you can create enough of those other options instead?
On the other hand i wouldnt mind making a combat centric cRPG some other time, with a setting like Malazan Book of the Fallen where a crew of a few Bridgeburners go around eradicating hundreds and thousand of all kinds of mooks, showing cusser up every fools bunghole, unleashing warrens and wasting whole armies.
But thats a game with different sensibilities. If i had a few hundred millions to throw at it i would probably do that one in some sort of Real time with---- pauuuuse, only pausing would be dependent on attributes and skills. Not free.
And with far more attention on the real time action part then on pausing.
But anyway, i think the combat design should be adapted to each specific kind of cRPGs, just like writing and anything else should be.
Instead of trying to hammer in one single style and wandering why it doesnt quite work or cant quite gel with some other features and intentions.
). That's not my idea of cRPGs, leave alone of well written cRPGs. I want to play my group of adventurers doing stuff, that's a mandatory premise, not an afternought to whatever else the creator has in mind, which anyway is almost akways either to tell "personal" (as concerning who some main characters are, not as low scale) story, which I hate, or to simplify the game, which I hate too. I can enjoy the QfG case of single character games with a focus on different non-combat gameplay depending on your build but it's not like there are many such games apart from QFG series, direct QFG clones or Dark Disciples 1&2 (Fallout 1&2 to some extent).
